Tuesday, August 31, 2010

3 Billion and Counting is in the vein of Super Size Me Meets Fahrenheit 911. This film follows the journey of Dr. Rutledge (a preventive medical doctor that grew up on a farm in Mississippi) as he travels the globe in 40 days to discover why so many women and children are still dying needlessly every 12 seconds from malaria as we speak...

He eventually finds himself in Washington DC where it all "went down" during the Nixon ERROR. He discovers that our very own US government, ONE MAN in particular, SCAMMED the American people with lies and deceit causing the death of untold millions.

He leaves no stone unturned in this heart-felt fact-finding mission that is chock full of shocking findings that are sure to open up a virtual BLIZZARD of long overdue debate.

Dr. Rutledge and his team take an in-depth look into a disease that has killed more people than any other: Malaria. Collecting testimonies from African, Indian and US Governments, charitable organizations, scientists, politicians, doctors, clinics, victims and survivors, the film exposes the politics behind domestic and international policies leading to the much-publicized 1972 ban of DDT (Dichloro-Diphenyl-Trichloroethane), believed at the time to be one of the most 'dirty' chemicals ever created by man. Despite DDT's effectiveness in eradicating malaria from the US, its ban was considered a hallmark victory by the early Environmental Movement.

The banning decision, however, was fraught with lies and controversies. DDT has since been proven to be - and always has been - one of the safest, most environmentally-sound and most effective chemicals for fighting malaria, able to save millions of lives in the developing nations. When the EPA, Greenpeace, WWF and the Sierra Club refuse interviews, Dr. Rutledge realizes he is at the epicenter of a little-known force behind the environmental policy-makers, whose political agenda and ideology come with a human cost. Pop star Debbie Gibson composed the original score and original title track "Rise". (Running time 1:42)Watch TrailerTheater Information

Monday, August 30, 2010

By Rich Kozlovich
As a member of the American Council on Science and Health (ASCH) I receive their Daily Dispatch, which covers all the latest scares promulgated by the greenies back to naturists, and Luddites who believe that modern innovations and everything produced by man is evil, including vaccinations. There were two issues that particularly struck me today, and one of them was titled, “Science Prevails in Courts, But Maybe Not Blogs”.

They note; “The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit reaffirmed Friday a conclusion reached long ago by scientists, upholding a decision that there is no link between autism and vaccines.“

This supported the decision made by Special Master Denise Vowell who ruled that all the evidence presented by the anti-vaccine crowd is “weak, contradictory and unpersuasive. Sadly, the petitioners in this litigation have been the victims of bad science conducted to support litigation rather than to advance medical and scientific understanding [of autism]."

The Appeals Court stated. “We have carefully reviewed the decision of the special master and we find that it is rationally supported by the evidence, well-articulated, and reasonable.”

Apparently Dr. Whelan of ASCH, has been exasperated by all of these conspiracy theories, junk science, and “quack remedies to make children whole again”. She states; “Finally it’s unanimous that there is no relationship between autism and vaccines, so when will this myth finally go away forever?”

This is an international movement and because of these activists parents have become so concerned that many have stopped having their children vaccinated for measles and whooping cough. In those areas of this country where they have abandoned vaccinations, or only use vaccines without the mercury preservative, the number of autism cases remains much the same. Where parents are eschewing vaccinations the rate of childhood diseases has increased, including whooping cough. I doesn’t seem to matter to these true believers, and the blogosphere will abound with more junk science and conspiracy theories as “long as Jenny McCarthy (another celebrity epidemiologist) keeps selling books.”

No one should have any delusions as to what can happen when society abandons that which has saved untold numbers. Let’s not make any mistake about this; society cannot escape the consequences of their choices. Everything we are told should bear some resemblance to what we see going on in reality. Let’s at least have a clear perspective on the subject based on history and events.

Measles is a highly contagious disease, so contagious that 100 years ago we used to quarantine homes where a family member was stricken with it in this country. Because of complacency and lack of funding in some African countries, vaccination rates dropped dramatically, and as anyone should expect, they are experiencing “the worst outbreaks of measles in years” - afflicting “thousands and killing hundreds across Africa,” and it became so prevalent that some mothers wouldn’t name their children until they survived a bout with measles. “About 164,000 people died from measles in 2008, down 78 percent from 733,000 in 2000, according to the Measles Initiative, which includes groups like the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) and the World Health Organisation.” However, UNICEF officials "fear the combined effect of decreased political and financial commitment to measles could reverse the gains, resulting in an estimated 1.7 million measles-related deaths globally between 2010 and 2013."

Who is accountable for these unnecessary illnesses and deaths? Better yet, why is no one accountable? We have a clear vision of the reality of a world without vaccinations. The facts are easily seen, easily found, and easy to understand. Vaccinations save lives in the third world, why would we think that it would be any different here? Why do we listen to these people?

Comments will not be accepted that are rude, crude, stupid or smarmy. Nor will I allow ad hominem attacks or comments from anyone who is "Anonymous”, even if they are positive!

There is a rub though; those with the financial wherewithal can afford to get rid of them. It is the people at the bottom of the economic structure that are suffering the most because they are left largely defenseless. They are also spreading them everywhere they go, and those who can afford it will find that they are being re-infested, along with the Empire State Building, Victoria’s Secret, Abercrombie and Fitch and a host of other businesses, including hotels…and that was just in New York City.

Alonso explained how Ohio (which the producer noted that no state has been as aggressive at fighting this problem as Ohio has) had requested an emergency 18 exemption for propoxur, a carbamate pesticide. Propoxur was the choice because it works and there was a label already in existence. That becomes important later in the article.

It is an admittedly short term solution because it is clear that they are already developing resistance to carbamates such as Ficam in other parts of the world. We used Ficam (which killed bed bugs on contact and as a residual by the way) successfully and safely for many years in this country, but the manufacturer pulled their registration. So why would they do such a thing? Well, first of all this happened before bed bugs exploded in this country and the manufacturer wasn’t selling enough to justify meeting the EPA’s demands.

You see, the EPA requires pesticides to be reregistered after fifteen years. That means more unnecessary and expensive testing. It costs around $300,000,000 to bring a new pesticide to market. Manufacturers want to make sure that re-registration is worth it to them before they spend millions of dollars more on re-testing. Further testing for what you might ask? Who knows, because after a product has been on the open market for fifteen years you absolutely know what, if any, hazards it represents to humanity or to nature. Most importantly after fifteen years these products have probably gone out of patent. That means there is less value to the primary registrant, and in this case, there was no value incentive for the manufacturer to spend millions of dollars more to retest.

This is just another way the EPA has found to eliminate pesticides without banning them, which can be a messy process; a process in which they would probably lose. When you ban something you have to show reasons for the ban. You have to have facts, figures and….most importantly….real science. If there is none; then the product stays. They have avoided all of that through their system of rules, and in point of fact these rules make it a de facto ban without any messy legal stuff.

Organophosphates, such as Dursban absolutely kill bed bugs; on contact and as well as a residual. But in 1996 the Food Quality Protection Act (FQPA) was passed and that changed all the rules again. There had always been a hundred fold safety factor tied up with pesticides. FQPA arbitrarily changed it to a thousand fold. I have tried to find out what science they used to decide that this massive change was necessary…and no one seems to know, because it is all based on assumptions.

Dow Chemical was the primary registrant of Dursban, but this product represented a small part of their overall sales so they decided to let the product go. Besides, it was out of patent and others were producing it. There was little value in fighting this battle. They made a business decision; a bad business decision in my mind, but these corporations are run by bean counters, not visionaries. It is interesting to hear scientists at EPA making claims about data that would have taken this product off the market anyway. Baloney! If they had tried that they would have lost.

In days gone by each pesticide had an evaluation that determined the risk of that product. FQPA changed that. All of a sudden it was decided that the risk attached to individual pesticides would not be enough. They created a “risk cup”, lumping all the pesticides in a chemical category together. Needless to say that risk cup filled up fast. They also didn’t give the manufactures enough time to develop the data they demanded. They told the manufacturers that if they didn’t get the data in the time designated time frame, then EPA would use “risk assumptions”. What did Alfonso Bedoya say in the Treasure of the Sierra Madre? "Badges? We ain't got no badges. We don't need no badges. I don't have to show you any stinking badges!" Well….EPA don’t need no stinking science.

Propoxur falls under this new FQPA regulated level of toxicity. We used Baygon (propoxur) for over twenty years in this nation and it was available to the general public as well. What terrible things happened? According to the Ohio Department of Agriculture; nothing terrible happened in Ohio! But when you change the rules arbitrarily you change the toxicity issues. To arbitrarily change the safety factor from one hundred to a thousand fold safety factor may not make much sense, but it makes it easy for EPA to claim that it is too toxic to use.

This brings me back to the CBS report. Marc Lame, an entomologist out of Indiana University, feels that the CBS report was “portraying Propoxur as solution denied is unbalanced and I believe, irresponsible.”

Let’s take a look at Lame’s rationale. He states “that the majority of control failures regarding bed bugs are a result of human error, poor cooperation with exterminators but more, poor technique by the exterminators." That is contemptible and misdirection! The discussion involves effective chemistry. While all of these factors may be true to some degree, these factors are meaningless if we have chemistry that works.

He then goes on to say “that bed bug control is making unqualified and unethical exterminators rich”. What is making exterminators “rich” is the fact that people like Lame promote every fallacious claim there is against pesticides, including one of his favorite ones, endocrine disruption. We would be more than happy to go back to normal treatments that are inexpensive, less labor intensive and more effective.

He derides exterminators for charging a lot of money and then promotes nonsense that is labor intensive and expensive. Then when the failure rate is high he claims we are corrupt. I know he makes a distinction between “qualified” operators versus “unqualified” operators, but the image the public will take away from that statement is that we are all incompetent and corrupt. That is contemptible!

Let me make this absolutely crystal clear…….these so-called “rich” exterminators aren’t the problem, they are the solution! However, it is my personal opinion that the real problem lies with self promoting Ph.D., EPA grant chasers!

There was a bed bug Integrated Pest Management (IPM) study done by researchers from Purdue University in 2009 using Diatomaceous Earth, hand removal, bed bug interceptors, diatomaceous earth dust, mattress encasements and hot steam, which they called (D-IPM). They also used something they called (S-IPM) using 0.5% chlorfenapyr (Phantom) which also included hand removal, mattress encasements, hot steam, but no bed bug interceptors.

This was done in a site was a 15-story apartment building located in Indianapolis, IN. “The building had 225 one-bedroom apartments occupied by low-income elderly or disabled people. Approximately 87 apartments experienced bed bug activity since 2007. “

After all these extensive treatments, re-inspections and retreats the end result was that “By week 10, mean bed bug count reduction by D-IPM and S-IPM were 97.6 _ 1.6 and 89.7 _ 7.3%, respectively. Bed bugs were eradicated (based on visual inspections and resident interviews) from 50% of the apartments in both groups. The maximum numbers of bed bugs found in each apartment at week 10 was 4 and 32 in the D-IPM and S-IPM groups, respectively.”

In short, after weeks of treatments and inspections these extremely competent researchers failed to rid bed bugs from fifty percent of the apartments they treated. Were these people “unqualified” and “unethical”? It might be worth noting this statement from the researchers; “effective residual insecticides are needed for bed bug elimination”, and this is from people wanting to seriously reduce the use of pesticides.

Marc derides the idea that Americans want a “quick fix” and exterminators for also wanting an “easy fix”. Has he lost his mind? Of course that is what everyone wants; why wouldn’t they? I have had friends tell me that they went into people’s homes and the children were bitten so badly that if they didn’t know what the problem was they would have called Children's Services. Explain to those people why they shouldn’t want a quick fix! Explain to me why they shouldn’t have one!

As for his comments about the “myth” of the “silver bullet”, the “pesticide treadmill” and “dependence on chemical pesticides to eradicate bed bugs is folly”. Why wouldn’t everyone want a “silver bullet”? When he discusses Dr. Miller I assume he is talking about Dini Miller, who he cites regarding comments about resistance developing to propoxur. Did someone think that we didn't already know that! This nonsense argument about hastening resistance is the biggest red herring of them all.

Resistance is the pattern in nature. Plants have an arsenal of pesticides they naturally produce to ward off attack by insects, and they need them, because insects develop resistance to what they are using to defend themselves. When that happens they produce other chemicals insects aren't resistant to. Bacteria have developed resistance to many of the antibiotics that we are currently using, and there are some staph infections that are almost uncontrollable. Does that mean we shouldn't use those that still work because it will hasten the level of resistance? If that happened people would die. That would be considered insane! Why then would we use any logic that would be considered insane in another arena as rational in pest control? The problem isn't that resistance will develop; the problem is that unlike plants we have decision makers who create regulations that prevent use of chemistry that works. They also make decisions that make the production of new pesticides unprofitable. I might add that this is the reason new antibiotics aren’t making it to the market either, and people like Marc are enablers of this kind of thinking based on junk science. If this is truly Dini Miller’s position I certainly hope that she will re-evaluate it!

Let's stop these insane arguments about resistance. I keep coming back to this argument. If bed bugs were transmitting some sort of deadly disease we wouldn't even be having this conversation. We would get Dursban tomorrow and bed bugs would be gone by the end of the week.

The problem is that propoxur is all we can ask for. We would love to have Dursban or any one of the organophosphates, but that wasn’t an option….we settled for what we could possibly get and what is desperately needed. WE KNOW this is only a stop gap measure. As for his comment that a “chemical tool can be a useful part of the management strategy but historically has failed as a stand-alone method”. Marc should be ashamed of himself. That is blatantly false.

The answer in 1946 was effective, inexpensive chemistry that was available to everyone! And before we lost so many tools to FQPA we did it with chemistry alone. Let’s not kid ourselves. Bed bugs have been brought in this country for decades by international travelers. In the mid 1980’s I did my first bed bug job. Some people from mainland China was visiting a factory to see how they operated and when they left they left their bed bugs in their hotel room. I treated the room with Ficam one time…..one time mind you ….. and the bed bugs were gone. Let’s get this right……if effective, inexpensive chemistry that is available to everyone isn’t the answer in 2010 there will be no answer. Let me say that again….. if effective, inexpensive chemistry that is available to everyone isn’t the answer in 2010 there will be no answer.

He goes on to say “Fortunately, we now have a number of technologies which can now be integrated to manage (prevent or control) bedbugs including monitoring devices, heat treatment, vacuuming, nonchemical pesticides like diatomaceous earth (hopefully used in the future with pheromone attractants) and a few reasonably effective chemical pesticides.”

The reality is that these techniques and “reasonably effective chemical pesticides” are not working for the vast majority of people in this nation. If it was otherwise, we wouldn’t be asking for propoxur and this problem wouldn’t be expanding to the point of being a plague on the nation. And apparently it didn’t work for him at the Monroe County Community School Corporation, where they wanted to “put out traps to see what happens”. I would like to draw everyone’s attention the Bloomington Elementary School in that system, where Lame was “was surprised to see them turn up inside the school.” How did they discover they had them? “A teacher found one of the parasites crawling on a student's jacket and soon found one crawling on another students clothing.” But there was to be no chemical treatments. Why? Their solution was to send out letters and use bed bug traps because as Lame says, “Bed bugs most often strike at night where people sleep or sit for long periods of time.” He goes on to say, "The kids are not sleeping here," Dr. Lame said. "Nobody sleeps here overnight. The bedding is not here. It's just not a nest for a nest parasite." Excuse me….but didn’t we just find out that they were moving from coat to coat. That is despicable! We absolutely know that bed bugs will live in any area they can, under carpeting, cracks and crevices, behind pictures, etc.

These self promoters propound so-called methodologies that are in reality philosophies. Philosophies that are based on the same kind of junk science Rachel Carson and the rest of the greenies spew out. When you spew out such ideologies you don’t need no stinking science.

The answer to bed bugs in 1946 was effective, inexpensive chemistry that was available to everyone. That was the answer in 1946 and if that isn't the answer in 2010 there will be no answer!

Comments will not be accepted that are rude, crude, stupid or smarmy. Nor will I allow ad hominem attacks or comments from anyone who is "Anonymous”, even if they are positive!

Saturday, August 21, 2010

A set of assumptions, concepts, values, and practices that constitutes a way of viewing reality for the community that shares them, especially in an intellectual discipline.

In short; it is how we look at the world. How we perceive reality. It is the basis of how we judge our actions and the actions of others.

Fully 25 percent of all federal regulations that have been passed involve environmental issues and EPA has only been in existence since 1970. Since that time we have a plethora of regulatory bodies at the state level to meet the minimum federal standards and in some states, like California, they go way beyond federal standards, and the Federal Registry increased from 62,000 pages to 75,000 pages in one three year period. President G.W. Bush passed more federal regulations than any president since Richard Nixon; and Nixon created, among other things, the EPA and OSHA.

Now we have a host of federal and state agencies, along with researchers and their universities imposing their views on society without regard to the impact of their actions. Yet we have to ask; what terrible thing happened to impose these kinds of costs and to give state and federal bureaucrats the authority to overturn the protections under the fourth amendment against unlawful search and seizure and self-incrimination under the fifth amendment of the U.S. Constitution?

I did the research and found that this was fought up to the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) and it was decided that in these cases state and federal bureaucrats, and their regulations, usurp the protections “guaranteed” by the Constitution. What regulation passed by any regulator to make society safer was not already covered under criminal and civil penalties of state or federal law?

Why is it when you ask everyone if they think it is okay that they say, for the most part; yes it is necessary. Environmental paradigms have become everything! It started with Rachel Carson when she wrote Silent Spring in 1962. Her book, which was lauded and continues to be lauded, launched the modern environmental movement. Yet, almost everything she touted in her book was conjecture, prediction or lies.

Her book was never peer reviewed because it didn’t start out as a published book. I started out as excerpted installments in New Yorker magazine. That presentation was so popular the book followed, and when you read her work you can understand why. She was a magnificent writer. I have been re-reading Silent Spring and I am now amazed at how poor her science was, in spite of the fact that her acolytes praise her as a scientist unendingly.

Her work was not science because it hadn’t been peer reviewed before publication. When it was, after the fact, it was discovered that everything she predicted failed to come true and in at least one case she knowingly and deliberately misrepresented the facts. Her book is full of anecdotal evidence (stories), which may or may not have been true, but there was no way to check it because she didn’t footnote source information for these stories. That isn’t science! She became the Mother Superior of the green movement, but in reality she was the mother of junk science.

Ultimately, this book was the justification for the formation of EPA by Richard Nixon, with the primary purpose of eliminating DDT. Everything you know about DDT is a lie. Yet the regulations and impositions continue! Now we have Non-Governmental Organizations (NGO’s) imposing their will and jumping on the “funding” bandwagon.

In 1790 the fledgling U.S. Federal government passed the Whiskey Tax. The result was that in 1792 they had armed rebellion that President George Washington had to put down with the Federal army. Who were the biggest supporters of this bill? The whiskey distillers in the large cities! Why? Because this would give them the competitive edge they needed over the backwoods farmers who made moonshine, which was easier to transport into the towns than corn was. Far more profitable too!

Apparently having all these government imposed regulators and regulatory agencies aren’t enough to satisfy large industry. We now have regulators for hire who are just like bureaucrats; they need activity to give the impression of accomplishment. And what is the only activity we can expect from a regulator? More regulations! And more regulations and taxes put the largest companies in a position that will allow them to avoid real competition.

Just as was the case with the Whiskey Act. Large companies and corporation love regulations and taxes. That is why they support all sorts of greenie nonsense because they believe they will profit from it and believe they will still survive, even if it is in some other form. But what about the consequences to society for adopting regulations that will restrict pesticides and pesticides applications to humanities detriment? That is the problem. These people never have to pay the consequences for their actions.

In order to generate some heterodoxy, I have four questions I would like to ask.

1. What terrible event or series of terrible events took place that would justify a SCOTUS decision that would give bureaucrats and government agencies the right to ignore the rights guaranteed under the Fourth and Fifth Amendments of the U.S. Constitution against illegal search and seizure and self incrimination?2. What civil and criminal penalties in state and federal pesticide laws administrated by state and federal agencies were not already covered under criminal and civil law?3. Have we been lied to regarding the need for all these regulations? 4. Will there ever be enough regulations?

The United States Constitution created three branches of government consisting of the Executive, the Legislative and the Judicial branches. The result of all of these regulations is that there are now actually four branches of the United States government; now we have the Bureaucracy. After the laws are passed these people are the ones who make the rules, they change the rules, they make all the decisions as to how the laws that are passed are to be interpreted; and without consequence. Why? They never have to answer for their actions.

They were not chosen by the people; they went to college, took a test and got hired. Most of them never have done anything except go to school and go into government, which we call “public service”!

How is it that those who create jobs, meet the payrolls and create the economy that we all enjoy aren’t considered public servants, but those who do nothing except undermine those who do are?

Why in the world would we think these people could possibly have any special insights as to how the economy or anything else should work? I find it interesting that in 1900 “government spending at all levels (local, state, and federal) represented 7.5 percent of Gross Domestic Product (GDP). Out of that amount 66 percent occurred at the local and state levels. Local government spent 55 percent, state government spent 11 percent, and the federal government spent the remaining 34 percent.”

Did it occur to anyone to ask; do we really need all these rules and regulations? Did it occur to anyone to ask; what would happen if these bureaucracies were eliminated and these people were fired?

Comments will not be accepted that are rude, crude, stupid or smarmy. Nor will I allow ad hominem attacks or comments from anyone who is "Anonymous”, even if they are positive!

Tuesday, August 17, 2010

The Monsanto Company is learning a valuable lesson in Haiti : no good deed goes unpunished at the hands of radical anti-corporate elements of Western society.

Like so many other concerned citizens, Monsanto responded to the tragic January 12 earthquake that further devastated this impoverished country. It worked for months with Haiti ’s Agricultural Ministry to select seeds best suited to local climates, needs and practices, and to handle the donation so as to support, rather than undermine, the country’s agricultural and economic infrastructure.

From Monsanto’s extensive inventory, they jointly chose conventionally bred hybrid (not biotech / genetically modified / GM) varieties of field corn and seven vegetables: cabbage, carrots, eggplants, onions, tomatoes, spinach and melons. Instead of giving the seeds to farmers, the company worked with the USAID-funded WINNER program, to donate the seeds to stores owned and managed by Haitian farmer associations. The 475 tons of hybrid seeds will then be sold to many thousands of farmers at steep discounts, and all revenues will be reinvested in local agriculture.

Other companies and donors are providing fertilizers, insecticide and herbicides that will likewise be sold at a discount. The companies, Agricultural Ministry, farmers associations and other experts will also provide technical advice and assistance – much as the USDA’s Cooperative Extension System does – on how, when and whether to use the various hybrids, fertilizers, and weed and insect-control chemicals.

The goal is simple. Help get the country and its farmers back on their feet, improve farming practices, crop yields and nutrition levels, and increase incomes and living standards.

Other self-anointed “peasant representatives” waded in. The seeds are genetically modified and “will exterminate our people.” Farmers won’t be able to afford the seeds or feed their children. The fertilizers are carcinogenic. Fungicides on the seeds are toxic poisons. “Seeds are the patrimony of humanity.” We support “food and seed sovereignty.” Traditional seeds and farming practices “provide stable employment” for the 70% of Haitians who are small farmers. And of course, “Down with Monsanto.”

Various U.S. churches and foundations chimed in. “Spontaneous” protests were organized in several Haitian and American cities. At one, hundreds of marchers wore identical shirts and hats, which even at a combined value of just $5 represented two weeks’ income for average Haitian farmers: 40 cents a day. One wonders how many would have shown up without these inducements.

Indeed, this abysmal income underscores the terrible reality of life in this island nation, even before the earthquake, and the perversity of this campaign against “corporate control of the food system.” Instead of “seed sovereignty” or “social justice,” the activists are ensuring eco-imperialism and poverty sovereignty.

Forty years ago, Haiti was largely self-sufficient in food production and actually exported coffee, sugar and mangoes. Today, the country imports 80% of its rice and 97% of the 31 million eggs it consumes monthly. Two-thirds of Haiti ’s people are farmers (roughly equivalent to the United States just after the Civil War), but their crop yields are among the lowest in the Western Hemisphere .

Few of Haiti ’s rural families have running water or electricity, and women spend hours a day cooking over open fires. Many contract serious lung diseases as a result, and life expectancy is twelve years lower than for people on the Dominican Republic side of the island.

Google satellite images reveal a lush green eastern DR two-thirds of Hispaniola – in stark contrast to the deforested, rutted, brown, impoverished Haitian side, from which enormous quantities of soil are washed into the ocean every year. Roads are so rutted that Peace Corps workers report traveling four hours by truck to go 60 miles. Many rural people cannot afford to feed their children, leaving hundreds of kids in poor highland areas literally starving to death.

Hybrid seeds can help Haitians climb out of this morass. Though no silver bullet, they are one of the cheapest, easiest and best investments a farmer can make. By simply planting different seeds and adding fertilizer, farmers can dramatically increase crop yields. A similar Monsanto donation of hybrid maize (corn) seeds and fertilizer to Malawi farmers in 2006 generated a 500% increase in yields and helped feed a million people for a year.

In the United States , organic and conventional farmers alike plant numerous hybrids. They cost more than traditional, open-pollinated seeds, but the payoff in yield, revenue, and uniformity of size, quality and ripening time makes the investment decision easy. Between 1933 and 2000, U.S. corn yields likewise expanded fivefold – thanks to hybrids, fertilizer, irrigation and innovative crop management practices – and today, hybrid or GM hybrid crops are planted on virtually every American field.

Some of the Haitian corn donation will be used to improve chicken farming and egg production. Most will likely be used in staples like sauce pois – corn mush topped with black or red beans cooked with coconut milk, hot peppers, onions, garlic and oil. The thickness of the bean sauce reflects a family’s income, and “wealthy” families often accompany the sauce with rice, instead of corn mush. The veggie seeds will add variety to family diets, and provide a source of income via sales at local markets.

The hybrids will also help Haiti adopt truly sustainable farming practices: higher germination rates and crop yields, greater revenues and better nutrition for more people, at lower cost, from less land, using less water and fewer pesticides, requiring less time in fields, and enabling more farmers to specialize in other trades and send their children to school. In short, greater opportunity and prosperity for millions.

And yet, activists continue to spew forth invective, preposterous claims and disinformation – primarily through the Huffington Post and several other irresponsible websites. Hybrid seeds don’t regenerate, they assert; wrong – they do and can be replanted, though they will not pass all their best traits down to subsequent generations, which is a primary reason farmers typically buy new seeds. The seeds are poisonous, they fume; false – the seeds are treated with fungicides that are used safely all over the USA , Western Europe and Latin America , to keep seeds from being destroyed by fungus before they germinate.

Monsanto will not force farmers to plant hybrid seeds – or say they can’t replant what they collect from previous harvests. Indeed, hybrids were widely just 30 years ago by Haitian farmers, who know what they are looking for in a crop, how to assess what they have planted and harvested, and whether they want to invest in specific seeds. They should be allowed to make their own decisions – just as others should be permitted to plant whatever traditional, heirloom or open-pollinated seeds they wish.

“We reject Monsanto seeds,” say anti-hybrid activists. They might, and that’s fine. But thousands of other Haitian farmers want to plant Monsanto seeds. Their right to choose must also be respected – not denied by intolerant protesters, who are largely funded and guided by well-fed First World campaigners.

After years of vicious assaults by agro and eco purists, Monsanto’s corporate skin is probably thick enough to survive these lies and often highly personal attacks. Other companies, however, might lack the fortitude to provide their expertise and technology after future disasters, in the face of such attacks.

That is almost certainly an objective for many of these anti-technology, anti-corporate groups. Monsanto has no maize financial interests in Haiti and only a tiny vegetable operation, and I have no financial interest in Monsanto. But for the world’s most destitute people, it would be a tragedy of epic proportions.

This article first appeared at the website Eco-Imperialism.I would like to thank Mr. Driessen for allowing me to re-publish his work. Mr. Driessen is the author or Eco-Imperialism, Green Power, Black Death. This is the apex of “green books” if you really want to know what the green movement is all about. It is a small paper back that is easy to read and doesn’t take a great deal of time. If you read this and your aren’t outraged then you have no heart. If there was any better book that outlines how many people have died and suffered as a result of greenie activities I don’t know what it is. Anyone and everyone who is involved in pesticides, whether at the manufacturing, distribution or application levels NEED to read this book! Any honest hearted person who is concerned about the environment, humanity and factual science needs to read this book. This is my selection as the best read Purchased through Eco-Imperialism web site. RK

Sunday, August 15, 2010

I would like to thank Mr. Driessen for allowing me to re-publish his work. This origianlly appeared here. Mr. Driessen is the author or Eco-Imperialism, Green Power, Black Death. This is the apex of “green books” if you really want to know what the green movement is all about. It is a small paper back that is easy to read and doesn’t take a great deal of time. If you read this and your aren’t outraged then you have no heart. If there was any better book that outlines how many people have died and suffered as a result of greenie activities I don’t know what it is. Anyone and everyone who is involved in pesticides, whether at the manufacturing, distribution or application levels NEEDS to read this book! Any honest hearted person who is concerned about the environment, humanity and factual science needs to read this book. This is my selection as the best read Purchased through Eco-Imperialism web site. RK

“Don’t let the bedbugs bite” is no longer a fashionable good-night wish for Big Apple kids, even in the city’s high-rent districts and posh hotels. Growing infestations of the ravenous bloodsuckers have New Yorkers annoyed, anguished, angry about officialdom’s inadequate responses, and “itching” for answers.

Instead, their Bedbug Advisory Board recommends a bedbug team and educational website. Residents, it advises, should monitor and report infestations. Use blowdryers to flush out (maybe 5% of) the bugs, then sweep them into a plastic bag and dispose properly. Throw away (thousands of dollars worth of) infested clothing, bedding, carpeting and furniture.

Hire (expensive) professionals who (may) have insecticides that (may) eradicate the pests – and hope you don’t get scammed. Don’t use “risky” pesticides yourself. Follow guideline for donating potentially infested furnishings, and be wary of bedbug risks from donated furniture and mattresses.

New Yorkers want real solutions, including affordable insecticides that work. Fear and loathing, from decades of chemophobic indoctrination, are slowly giving way to a healthy renewed recognition that the risk of not using chemicals can be greater than the risk of using them (carefully). Eco-myths are being replaced with more informed discussions about alleged effects of DDT and other pesticides on humans and wildlife.

Thankfully, bedbugs have not been linked to disease – except sometimes severe emotional distress associated with obstinate infestations, incessant itching, and pathetic “proactive” advice, rules and “solutions” right out of Saturday Night Live.

It is hellish for people who must live with bedbugs, and can't afford professional eradication like what Hilton Hotels or Mayor Bloomberg might hire. But imagine what it’s like for two billion people who live 24/7/365 with insects that definitely are responsible for disease: malarial mosquitoes.

Malaria infects over 300 million people annually. For weeks or months on end, it renders them unable to work, attend school or care for their families – and far more susceptible to death from tuberculosis, dysentery, HIV/AIDS, malnutrition and other diseases that still stalk their impoverished lands.

This vicious disease causes low birth weights in babies and leaves millions permanently brain-damaged. It kills over a million annually, most of them children and mothers, the vast majority of them in Africa. It drains families’ meager savings, and magnifies and perpetuates the region’s endemic poverty.

Emotional distress? Imagine the stress that comes from having no escape from destitution and disease; having to support a child with a perpetual ten-year-old’s mental functions; burying your baby, wife or sibling; or wondering whether you can walk twenty miles to a clinic, before the child you are carrying dies, and whether the clinic will have (non-counterfeit) medicine to cure her.

Frustration over absurd bedbug “solutions”? Imagine the reaction Africans must have to “malaria no more” campaigns that claim they will (eventually) eradicate the disease solely with insecticide-treated bed nets, drugs, “capacity building,” education and (maybe someday) mosquitoes genetically engineered not to carry malaria parasites. As to insecticide spraying, and especially DDT – fuggetaboutit.

DDT is the most powerful, effective, long-lasting mosquito repellant ever invented. Spraying the eaves and inside walls of mud huts and cinderblock homes every six months keeps 80% of the flying killers from entering. It irritates most that do enter, so they leave without biting, and kills any that land. However, many aid agencies refuse to encourage, endorse or fund spraying.

Many don’t even want to monitor mosquito and malaria outbreaks, or determine actual success in reducing disease and death rates. That would be more difficult and expensive than counting the number of bed nets distributed, and underscore the embarrassing reality that their “comprehensive” (and politically correct) insecticide-free programs achieve only 20-40% reductions in morbidity and mortality. By contrast, as South Africa and other countries have demonstrated, adding insecticides and DDT can bring 95% success.

We would never consider 20-40% fewer deaths a “success” for American children. Why should Africa?

Since EPA banned DDT in 1972 – after the United States and Europe had eradicated malaria – billions have been stricken by the vicious diseases, and tens of millions have died. That is intolerable.

We need adult supervision and informed debate on pesticide policies, laws and regulations. We can no longer leave those decisions to unaccountable anti-chemical activists in pressure groups and government agencies. These zealots are making decisions that determine the quality of life for millions of Americans, especially poor families – and life itself for billions of malaria-threatened people worldwide.

If not for the economic and mental health of Americans afflicted by bedbugs – support responsible, ethical policies for Africa’s sick, brain-damaged, and dying parents and children.

Comments will not be accepted that are rude, crude, stupid or smarmy. Nor will I allow ad hominem attacks or comments from anyone who is "Anonymous”, even if they are positive!

Saturday, August 14, 2010

This article has weighed on my mind ever since I started in on Friday. This is Monday and it is the third time I have updated it, and as time goes by I will probably do it again. RKThis has been updated on 2/11/11. This has been updated on 2/24/11This has been updated on 3/21/11

Recently I had an interesting conversation with one of my customers who turned out to be an atheist. The conversation started out about how Islam is not a religion of peace (and I don’t care what these idiots in politics say) since their religion requires them not to be moderate. They can kill, rape, steal, lie and do whatever else they like in the name of Islam and its ok. That led to a discussion on the Crusades and the Inquisition. Eventually we came to atheists.

Being an atheist she proclaimed that at least they don’t go around killing people. I looked at her with a smile of incredulity and said…I’m sorry…except for the environmentalists atheists have killed more people than anyone in modern history.

Although under no circumstances should it be construed that I am justifying the atrocities of the Crusades and Inquisition; but Lenin, Stalin, Hitler and Mao were atheists and killed far more than all of those combined, and with the exception of Hitler, those they killed were all their own people. Mao deliberately starved thirty six million to death because he needed cash to buy armament. How did he get it? He sold the food these people needed to survive. He said that this may only be the beginning and far more may have to die for him to attain his goals. So much for the “people’s revolution”!

These people committed some of the greatest crimes against humanity every recorded in history, yet Hitler is mostly singled out for that distinction. Why? Not that he didn’t deserve it mind you; but that is the rub isn’t it? Who decides what constitutes a crime against humanity?

Hitler proved that killing 6 million Jews is a crime against humanity because his henchmen were charged, found guilty, and many were executed for carrying out his orders. Joseph Stalin killed fifty million of his own people with the help of (among a host of others) Leonid Brezhnev, who became the leader of the USSR from 1964 till 1982. Neither of which were smeared with the epithet of ‘mass murderer’ or charged with crimes aginst humanity by any sitting official of any kind anywhere. In point of fact, neither Nixon, Ford or Jimmy Carter seemed to have any problem at all dealing with this mass murderer.

Walter Duranty even received a Pulitzer Prize for writing articles that claimed that Stalin wasn't killing anyone; and everyone in journalism working in Russia knew his work was nothing but lies. A Pulitzer Prize that the New York Times refuses to return ; a Pulitzer Prize the Pulitzer Prize committee, in spite of the fact that it has been proven beyond a shadow of a doubt that Duranty was a fraud, refuses to revoke.

Mao Tse Tung killed even more people yet Richard Nixon along with Henry Kissinger sat around like old buddies with Mao and his partner in mass murder Chou En-lai. Apparently you have to lose a war to be a mass murderer; perhaps that explains why no one in the environmental movement has ever been charged with any crime against humanity. The media and the political element will only stand up for what is right when the agenda fits their needs or view of reality - facts notwithstanding.

Thomas Sowell made a worthwhile observation regarding the media and this mass murderer saying;

"The mainstream media never expressed half the outrage about Mao Zedong as they did about Ronald Reagan. Yet, when it came to killing millions of innocent civilians, even Hitler was an amateur compared to Mao."

Then let's not forget Hollywood's favorite atheist and mass murderer, Fidel Castro. "According to the Cuba Archive Project, the Castro regime – with firing squads, forced-labor camps and drownings at sea – has caused an estimated 102,000 Cuban deaths. Cuba was a nation of 6.5 million people in 1960. Put your calculator to it and you’ll see that—per-capita wise--Castro and Che were close on the heels of their heroes and mentors Stain and Mao." These men slaughter men, children and even pregnant women; and yet prominent people today, who should know better, have this to say;

2.Meeting Fidel Castro were the
eight most important hours of my life." Steven Spielberg.

3."Very selfless and moral.
One of the world's wisest men." Oliver Stone 4.Cuba's Elvis." Dan
Rather

5."A Dream come true."
Supermodel Naomi Campbell

6. "Socialism works. I think
Cuba can prove that." Chevy Chase

7. "Castro is an
extraordinary man. He is warm and understanding and seems extremely
humane." Gina Lollobrigida

In 1996 when Castro visited NYC he was called the “The Toast of Manhattan” by Time magazine. Newsweek called him “The Hottest Ticket in Manhattan” discussing the social swirl he had caused. Humberto Fontova wrote an article about this called, Happy Thanksgiving! (From Fidel and Che) about how Fidel is embraced by people that should know better. We are aghast of the 9/11 destruction of the Twin Towers, yet Fidel Castro and Che had planned something just as heinous, if not more so, in 1962.

“Cuban agents had targeted Macy’s, Gimbel’s, Bloomingdales, and Manhattan’s Grand Central Station with a dozen incendiary devices and 500 kilos of TNT. The holocaust was set for detonation the following week, on the day after Thanksgiving…. the year’s biggest shopping day, for good measure. Thousands of New Yorkers, probably mostly women and children, were to be incinerated and entombed.”

Was he treated as a murderous maniac?

First there was “a luncheon at the Council on Foreign Relations. After holding court there for a rapt David Rockefeller, along with Robert McNamara, Dwayne Andreas, and Random House’s Harold Evans, Castro flashed over to Mort Zuckerman’s Fifth Avenue pad, where a throng of Beltway glitterati, including Mike Wallace, Peter Jennings, Tina Brown, Bernard Shaw, and Barbara Walters, all jostled for a photo op, and stood in line for Castro’s autograph. Diane Sawyer was so overcome in the mass-murderer’s presence that she rushed up, broke into a toothy smile, wrapped her arms around Castro, and smooched him warmly on the cheek.”

“God Bless you, Fidel,” boomed Pastor Calvin Butts of Harlem’s Abyssinian Baptist Church while introducing Castro on another New York visit four years later. The People’s Weekly World described Castro’s visit as such: “The audience which included New York Democratic representatives Charles Rangel enthusiastically greeted the Communist leader with a ten minute standing ovation. Chants of ‘FIDEL!-FIDEL! VIVA-FIDEL!’ resounded from the rafters.”

“Then with Congressperson Maxine Waters looking on in rapture, a beaming Charlie Rangel waddled up to the podium beside the terrorist (and racist) Castro and engulfed him in a mighty bear hug. Castro had to catch his breath, but he smiled and returned the rotund senator’s passionate abrazo.”

In March of 2011 Humberto Fontova wrote and article entitled, "Women’s History Month and Castro’s Female Victims" wherein he outlines the media's complete contempt for truth, reality and the poor innocents who suffered at his hands. He states; "When Barbara Walters sat quivering alongside Fidel Castro in 1977 cooing: “Fidel Castro has brought very high literacy and great health-care to his country. His personal magnetism is powerful.” dozens of Cuban suffragettes suffered in torture chambers within walking distance of the hyperventilating Ms. Walters." He went on to say; "I also apologize for singling out Barbara Walters. NBC’s Andrea Mitchell also had praise for the tryant: “Fidel Castro is old-fashioned, courtly–even paternal, a thoroughly fascinating figure!”

And what was Casto's reaction to all of this adoration? “You people are the cream of the crop!” beamed the Stalinist/terrorist to the smiling throng he’d come within a hair of nuking in 1962.

“Hear, hear!” chirped the delighted guests, while tinkling their wine glasses in honor of the smirking agent of their near vaporization." There really isn't any cure for stupid! Then again, perhaps it is just that this doesn't fit the media-political paradigm of the day? Either way.....there really isn't any cure for stupid.

What if one person is deliberately murdered for philosophical reasons, is that a crime against humanity? We know for sure that it takes somewhere between one death and six million deaths to constitute a crime against humanity and it must fit the media-political pagadigm of the day. What if tens of millions have been killed as a result of policies pursued by the environmental movement and implemented by governmental authorities? Surely that must be considered a crime against humanity? Perhaps this doesn't fit the media-political paradigm of the day?

For those who continue to say there are provisions which allows for DDT use in emergency situations and that DDT wasn’t banned in many areas of Africa; baloney, it is all wall paper.

“Yet African states are still put under pressure to avoid using DDT. This year the EU warned of possible agricultural sanctions against Uganda, Kenya and other countries that defiantly use DDT and vow to continue doing so. An EU official warned the Ugandan authorities that if indoor spraying of DDT meant there was ‘a risk of contamination of the food chain’, then while ‘[it] would not automatically lead to a ban of food products…it will mean that that particular consignment cannot be sent to Europe’ (5). ‘The EU should be saying that DDT is safe and poses no threat to EU consumers’, says Innis. ‘Instead they make either direct or oblique threats about possible trade sanctions. What they’re really saying is, “We’ve benefited from DDT and gotten rid of malaria but you people in Africa cannot do the same”.’

“Almost two decades after the country banned the use of DDT, the Government is under pressure to lift the ban as one of the effective ways of controlling the spread of malaria. At the same time, there is pressure on the Government not to lift the ban on the insecticide, which remains banned in many countries in the world. The pressure comes in the wake of the heads of state conference in Abuja, which passed a resolution to put emphasis on and promote the use of indoor residual spraying to help fight the malaria vector.”

The outside pressure is tremendous on these leaders from the green movement.

We now know that by not using DDT millions have died unnecessarily and yet the greenies, the EU, United Nations authorities and the Environmental Protection Agency continue to stand against its use. It would appear to me that someone is guilty of crimes against humanity. The world court is hot to try people for all sorts of things, but why is it that no one with the authority to charge greenies with these crimes has noticed that a crime against humanity has been committed? Perhaps this doesn't fit the media political-paradigm of the day!

Depending on who you read, the number that have died from malaria alone runs between fifty and one hundred million since 1972. That doesn’t count the many other mosquito borne diseases that are transmitted to an unprotected population. Since all of this is a direct result of greenie activities; is this not a crime against humanity? Perhaps this doesn't fit the media-political paradigm of the day!

They stand against a genetically modified food called Golden Rice, which would prevent five hundred thousand children from going blind each year in Southeast Asia. In Africa they convinced leaders not to let their starving people eat genetically modified corn because it would cause cancer in their people. Untold numbers died. Thousands died and tens of thousands were sickened in South America when they convinced leaders there to eliminate chlorine in the water supplies because they claimed it caused cancer. Since all of this is a direct result of greenie activities; is this not a crime against humanity? Perhaps this doesn't fit the media-political paradigm of the day!

There are those who arrogantly and smugly scoff at the very idea that anything the green movement does can be considered a crime; and if this was sixty, fifty, forty or even thirty years ago society would have agreed with them. Very few actually knew what was really going on and no one listened. We simply didn't know any better because the media kept the truth from society. But we now have the internet, and that has allowed the evidence of time and science to be made known. We now know that the positions they had taken were not only wrong but evil. Evil because the environmental stands that they have taken have been tested by time; and people are still dying and suffering needlessly because of them, and they know it. Why has no one been charged with crimes aginst humanity? Perhaps this doesn't fit the media-political paradigm of the day!

They know it! At the heart of the environmental movement they believe that humanity is the planet's greatest disease and must be eliminated. Prince Phillip once said that he would like to be reincarnated as a virus for that purpose. Apparently being detached from reality is a requirement to be a Royal and a greenie. For someone to be aware that they are taking a position that they know will kill untold numbers has to be criminal. Yet they continue to insist on standing their ground on all of their misanthropic postions. How can this not be crimes against humanity? Perhaps this doesn't fit the media -political paradigm of the day!

If you don’t want to call these events crimes against humanity, could we at least agree that this certainly represents depraved indifference? That is a crime also, and yet these are the people deciding what pesticides (if any) should be allowed, if genetically modified foods can be grown and sold, if chlorine and fluoride should be allowed in our water supplies, whether we can use fertilizers and herbicides on our fields, what foods we should eat, whether hydroelectric dams can be built and whether oil should be or will be drilled and where.

Does anyone feel any more confident now? Perhaps we can just get a copy of the New York Times to find out how we should feel.

Comments will not be accepted that are rude, crude, stupid or smarmy. Nor will I allow ad hominem attacks or comments from anyone who is "Anonymous”, even if they are positive!

Friday, August 13, 2010

1. To fight the battles that the pest control industry refuses to see, or sees but refuses to address.

2. To better inform the pest control industry that Integrated Pest Management (IPM) and Green Pest Control is an unscientific dream of the greenies, government regulators and their fellow travelers in the pesticide chemical manufacturing distribution and application industries that will become a constantly recurring nightmare.

3. To present enough information to give those in the industry who agree with me the intellectual ammunition needed to challenge what is now becoming conventional wisdom, which I prefer to call the Philosophical Flavor of the Day.

4. To outline lists of questions that will allow those who agree with me to have the ability to place the burden of proof on those who are attempting to impose regulations on our industry that will eventually destroy structural pest control, and as bed bugs have shown, wreck havoc on the nation’s people.

Unfortunately, it becomes very apparent that trying to stay focused on one issue with the environmental activists is impossible. They ubiquitously stick their noses into everything. As a result all of these issues overlap. While addressing our industry's concerns I have come to realize these overlapping issues also present overlapping challenges with overlapping answers requiring overlapping logic. These issues are presented in such complicated ways that it takes some time to realize that all of these challenges are presented with the same lines of logic, because the environmental cabals who present these issues use the same illogical junk science mentality; which are the same logical fallacies and intellectual dishonesty used by the rest of the Left. The patterns repeat over and over again.

Climate change is much larger than most realize. Not because of the potential danger to humanity and the world from global warming. It is huge because the warming activists have thrown all their efforts into this and the science is killing them. A large number of the science sites are full of information showing that this is a naturally occurring phenomenon. Here is one such site that addresses this issue with an objective eye.

Unfortunately the only information we were, and are, getting from the Main Stream Media (MSM) supports the view that global warming is anthropogenic and as a result we have the ability to make the climate do what we want.

We can’t accurately predict tomorrow’s weather and so get this; we are going to make the climate do what we want on a worldwide scale? What nonsense! Yet we had people like Al Gore asking the MSM to donate advertising time to promote the global warming scare.

If it had truly been scientific; why did it have to be sold? He announced there would be an upcoming coalition of environmental, labor, religious and other groups that will be raising money to buy airtime for ads over the next three years to address this issue.

Once again, why did it have to be sold? Why was selling this issue to a non-scientific gullible public so important? Because the science didn’t support it then and it doesn’t support it now! However, without being scared to death the public would not demand that something be done by political leaders. And now Al the High Priest of the Warming Globe whines that “our government has failed us".

If the MSM was going to donate airtime, why did it not donate airtime for a public debate on global warming. Let “The Sky is Falling Al”, and his allies present their information against those that see this issue differently in a public forum without any ability for either side to spin. This of course did not happen. The Mother of Junk Science, Rachel Carson led the way with Silent Spring by going public without facing peer review and thereby bypassed all science based safe guards.

How does this apply to structural pest control? This web address takes you to a web site that appears to be a corporation set up by EPA and Cornell University whose goal is to promote IPM. Why does it have to be promoted (sold) to the public? Now we have to ask ourselves:

• If science supports IPM, why does it have to be sold?

• EPA certainly has the authority to impose it by merely changing the labels on pesticides. Why don’t they?

• If there is no science behind this effort, why are they trying to “sell” it to the public?

• At public events, why isn’t anyone who is opposed to IPM invited to present anything at any national forum?

• Why isn’t the idea of a national debate on IPM an idea whose time has come?

• If IPM in structural pest control was based on real science, wouldn’t an open debate be the ideal way to get everyone on board by exposing the flaws in the arguments of those that believe there is no such thing as IPM in structural pest control?

• Why aren’t we seeing articles stating views that are opposed to IPM in the publications of our industries information deliverers? I’m not talking about occasional letters to the editor. I am talking about regular features opposing ipm just as we see regular feature articles promoting IPM.

The patterns keep repeating over and over again. All of these issues, whether it is IPM, pesticides, endocrine disruptors, carcinogens, global warming, endangered species, saving the trees, clear air or clean water issues are in reality the same issue couched in different terms, with the same goal. Eliminate real science, eliminate people and dominate those that are left. Since this will be the end result of enacting these policies; this must be their goal. If it quacks like a duck and walks like a duck, it must be a duck.

Onkar Ghate made this observation; Man's method of survival – transforming nature to meet his needs – must be defended against environmentalism's attack. Do you agree with that? If you do, how can you justify supporting IPM or Green Pest Control? If you are opposed to that concept are you an eco-terrorist? This would be a good time to apply what I call “Sowell’s Critique For Change”. There are three questions to the Critique.

1. As compared to what?

2. How much is it going to cost?

3. What hard evidence do you have?

These three questions by Thomas Sowell could be an excellent basis for a public debate at one of our industry’s national forums regarding IPM and Green Pest Control. At some point we must begin to realize that this just isn’t about business, pesticides and regulations. At some point we must come to grips with the fact that this is a moral issue. We are part of that thin gray line that stands in defense of the nation’s health. We are part and parcel of the public health service. We are “The Rat Catchers Child"! If we don’t take a moral position on all of this; are we not as lost as the green activists and their acolytes in government? We are the experts! We are society’s last best hope in these matters.

But are we courageous enough to reach out and grab the battle standard of our fallen predecessors?

Comments will not be accepted that are rude, crude, stupid or smarmy. Nor will I allow ad hominem attacks or comments from anyone who is "Anonymous”, even if they are positive!

Every so often we will get a notice that some bill or other is being promoted that will severely impact the use of pesticides. The School Environmental Protection Act is one such bill. It keeps getting introduced by Barbara Boxer or one of her co-conspirators every year or so, but these days it is always dead in the water. That demonstrates how bad this bill is. Because almost everything the activist foist on the public it starts out with….”It’s for the children”, and usually legislators just wither when they hear that. No legislative wants to vote against anything “that is for the children”.

When promoting a bill they usually have what are called ‘findings’ to justify the reason for any bill to be considered and acted upon. What is the reason for SEPA (H.R. 4159, at the time) to appear once again? They claim, among other things, that “childhood cancer is continuing to increase at the alarming rate of 1 percent per year; the overall incidence of childhood cancer has increased over the past 30 years, making cancer the leading cause of childhood death from disease.” This simply isn’t true!

As a member of the American Council on Science and Health (ASCH) I receive something called the Daily Dispatch which gives me a daily update on all of the science issues of our time; new and old, legitimate science and junk science.

I sent the link for H.R. 4159 to Jeff Stier and others at ASCH and pointed out the so-called “scientific” justification for the bill. I don’t know that sending it to them made any impact on their actions, but I am glad that they made the effort to include this in the Daily Dispatch the following day.

“Every day 'environmental' activists refer to the cancer epidemic, claiming that cancer rates are going up,” says ACSH's Jeff Stier. “Once again, we see there that this simply is not the case. On the contrary, cancer rates continue to go down by about one percent each year across the board, thanks to improved screening and early detection. With colon cancer, for example, screening by colonoscopy actually decreases incidence of the disease.”

ACSH's Dr. Gilbert Ross adds, “I find it instructive that the New York Times dealt with this important story by putting an AP briefing on it on page A24. Imagine where they would have placed a story about rising cancer rates.”

Protecting children is not a negotiable item. That is why the activists use the tact, “it’s for the children”! Whenever you hear that that phrase it’s time to stop and listen very carefully, because an emotional trigger such as that must be viewed with a doubtful eye. It doesn’t necessarily mean that they are wrong! However it can mean that they are strong on ideology and weak on facts, and in some cases it means they are lying. That is why you have to pay close attention and question everything.

If they can create the impression that pesticides are causing anything harmful in the nation’s children the public will not be “reasonable” they will not “understand” and they will not listen to the lengthy explanations that many times are necessary to overcome greenie sound bites. The public will demand that something must be done before it is too late. And the activists will make any outrageous claim necessary to make their demands become reality. Which to the anti-pesticide activists means to ban something in some way or another. That is what these bills attempt to do, but in a roundabout way.

Their goal is not to outright ban pesticides, but to regulate pesticides to the point that it becomes impossible to use them. They will not be “banned” on paper but that won’t matter. I often hear how DDT wasn’t banned entirely because there were emergency exemptions that would allow for its use. So what! The fact that DDT wasn’t banned on paper in its entirety doesn’t alter the fact that it was a de facto ban none the less. The end result is that activists see things as a long term goals; which is far different than what industry executives see, i.e., the next quarterly return. This gives corporate executives the false impression that they can deal with the activists.

In reality the activists have incrementally baby stepped their way to where they wished to go sixty years ago. Corporate bigwigs retire and new short term thinkers take their place, but the activists goals and concepts remain. The faces might change, but it really doesn’t matter….they are ideological and philosophical clones of their predecessors.

The anti-pesticide movement needs no individual or group of individuals because their philosophy is timeless. They are like a hydra growing new heads while the body remains the same. Whoever is there, in any time frame, will carry on with the same principles, philosophies and goals that were promoted by those who preceded them. It isn’t just one more issue occurring one more day. It is a crusade that will never stop and can only be defeated by absolute observance of the first rule of science.

“De Omnibus Dubitandum” – Doubt everything!

Comments will not be accepted that are rude, crude, stupid or smarmy. Nor will I allow ad hominem attacks or comments from anyone who is "Anonymous”, even if they are positive!

Thursday, August 12, 2010

Once again I wish to thank Alan for allowing me to publish his work. Alan opines daily....with vigor.... at Warning Signs. A blog worth reading dialy. This article originally appeared here. RK
On August 12, the Environmental Protection Agency sent out a press release, “EPA Proposes Rules on Clean Air Act Permitting for Greenhouse Gas Emissions”.

It is a frontal attack on the U.S. economy that is currently in the throes of a decline that has not been seen since the Great Depression.

If the EPA succeeds in this Big Lie, the provision of affordable energy in America will cease.

“The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is proposing two rules to ensure that businesses planning to build new, large facilities or make major expansions to existing ones will be able to obtain Clean Air Act permits that address their greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.”

The Clean Air Act does not cover carbon dioxide (CO2) which the EPA deems the primary GHG. This is because poses no threat to the environment and, indeed, is a vital and essential element of the environment insofar as all vegetation from a blade of grass to a giant Sequoia tree is dependent on it for growth.

Moreover, the proposed regulation of CO2 is based on the global warming fraud that says that it is responsible for a significant warming of the planet. There is not a scintilla of proof of this and, indeed, the Earth is presently in one of its natural cycles of cooling, not warming.

Thus, there is no scientific justification for the regulation of carbon dioxide no matter how many times the EPA says there is.

The EPA release says “projects that will increase CHG emissions substantially will require an air permit.”

If American industry, particularly the targeted “power plants and oil refineries”, are required to get GHG permits, it will put yet another huge sector of the nation’s economy under the thumb of the most insidious exponents of the global warming fraud, enemies of any economic growth.

“The Tailoring Rule covers large industrial facilities like power plants and oil refineries that are responsible for 70 percent of the GHGs from stationary sources,” says the EPA news release.

What it doesn’t say is that this power to regulate that does not exist in the present Clean Air Act.

It will cause electricity costs to skyrocket along with gasoline and all other oil derivatives. It will utterly wreck the U.S. economy that is already in dire straits.

If an invading nation had imposed these kinds of restrictions on Americans, we would be in the streets with guns and any other means to fight them.

There is NO global warming. Carbon dioxide plays NO role in this non-event.

This is regulation by deception, by lies, by the arrogance of environmentalists who view the human race as a cancer on the planet.

And, naturally, they have waited until Congress has gone on recess to “propose” this attack on the nation.

Take action! Contact your Representatives and Senators. Drown the White House in protests.

Comments will not be accepted that are rude, crude, stupid or smarmy. Nor will I allow ad hominem attacks or comments from anyone who is "Anonymous”. There have been a number of anonymous comments that were very supportive of my articles. Those comments were not posted because they were “Anonymous”. I thank those who have done so, but I will stay consistent to my rules for posting comments. RK

After decades during which bed bugs were a rare event, they now make headlines infesting places from the Jersey City Goldman Sacks building to a Victoria’s Secret shop on New York’s Upper East Side, along with dormitories, apartments and homes throughout the nation

The bed bug explosion is more related to the loss of the means to exterminate them than the bugs themselves. The bed bugs are doing what all insect populations do; they are reproducing by the billions.

On August 10, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) issued a “consumer alert” whose sole purpose was to continue its drumbeat of fear regarding any use of pesticides and to imply that pest control professionals could not be trusted to help one rid themselves of this ubiquitous pest.

All pest control professionals are subject to state licensing and annual certification to ensure they receive training in the proper methods of applying pesticides. Many firms conduct in-house training sessions year-round and the profession’s trade associations provide seminars as well. Suffice to say that everything about the provision of pest control services is highly regulated.

Since its founding in 1970, the EPA has dedicated itself to banning as many pesticides as possible. Its first “victory” was the banning of DDT in 1972. The result has been upwards of 90 million deaths from malaria worldwide. The truth is that DDT saved more lives than any chemical in human history until being banned from use in the U.S. and by other nations.

I have worked with the pest control industry for a quarter century and in the 1980s I helped promote an extraordinary pesticide, Ficam, a product that effectively killed a wide range of insect pests and was applied with nothing more dangerous than water!

After years of safe use, the EPA told the manufacturer that it had to re-register the product. Having previously spent around $15 million for the original registration, the British-owned company did the math and concluded it would be too expensive to go through the process again. It is no longer available in America.

The EPA’s action had nothing to do with the efficacy of the pesticide. It had everything to do with its unspoken policy of driving pesticides off the marketplace, whether for use by pest control professionals, for agricultural use, or by the general public.

And that is why America is experiencing a bed bug epidemic.

According to a joint statement on bed bug control from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the EPA, “Though the exact cause is not known, experts suspect the resurgence is associated with increased resistance of bed bugs to available pesticides…” and other causes such as greater international and domestic travel.

One pretty good guess at the “exact cause” is the continued loss of pesticides with which to knock down insect and rodent populations that nature provides in the billions.

In the “Bed Bug Handbook”, a guide for pest control professionals, “People often assume that any EPA-registered product that has bed bug treatment instructions on its label must be effective at controlling bed bugs. But this is not necessarily true. EPA policy is to rely on market forces to ensure that a product does what it claims; the agency does not require efficacy testing.”

The EPA and countless “environmental” organizations have effectively “educated” Americans to be afraid of chemicals in general and pesticides in particular. The claim is that they pose a threat to people’s health and this is true if one drinks them direct from the container. All poisons are based on the “dose”, the amount of exposure and, in the hands of a pest management professional, that factor will be very-low-to-none.

Today’s pest management professionals go about their job using the principles of Integrated Pest Management. High on the list is the least use of pesticides to knock down a pest population.

Ask yourself why, a hundred years before the invention and widespread use of pesticides, was an American’s average life span was about forty years of age? Given the use of pesticides, why do we now live up to eighty years? The answer is that pesticides protect lives and property too.

There is no real logic behind the EPA’s continued efforts to ban pesticides, but there is an illogical, unreasoned, and a lot of very dubious “science” behind the relentless effort to deprive Americans of the protection pesticides provide.

As I frequently remind people, take away the pesticides and all you have left is pests.

In the case of bed bugs, you have a particular pest that is very difficult to eliminate without a lot of intensive effort and the need to return to the scene of the infestation to get at those bed bugs that were hidden away between blood meals and will survive, become active, and lay eggs that become nymphs in a new generation to be exterminated.

It should come as no surprise that the joint CDC-EPA statement was heavy with warnings about “pesticide misuse” and “greater risk of pesticide exposure for those living in a home.”

The advice offered is laughable. It recommends using “monitoring devices” when most people learn about a bed bug infestation when they get bitten!

The statement recommends “removing clutter where bed bugs can hide”, “vacuuming”, and “using non-chemical pesticides (such as diatomaceous earth” and, finally, “judicious use of effective chemical pesticides” as the last choice.

The message is that it is the pesticides that are the problem, not the bed bugs. The reason we have seen a bed bug explosion is that the EPA has eliminated many of the pesticides that were formerly in use, creating the perfect storm, a growing resistance to those still registered for use.

The bed bugs don’t care that a generation or two of Americans have been brainwashed to think pesticides are bad, but you should.

Monday, August 9, 2010

By Rich KozlovichRecently, there was a naming bill introduced into the Ohio Senate to officially name a month of the year the “Multiple Chemical Sensitivity Syndrome Awareness Month.” Fortunately through some legislative legerdemain that I don’t understand, this bill was put on hold. However, as I understand it was done in such a way that may allow for it to come up again. As a result, I think it worthwhile to explore the whole concept of Multiple Chemical Sensitivity Syndrome (MCS).

When someone is diagnosed with “Multiple chemical sensitivities syndrome,” life changes radically. Dr Ronald E. Gots, executive director of Environmental Sensitivities Research Institute in Rockville, Maryland, a clearinghouse for scientific data, notes that “the diagnosis of MCS begins a downward spiral of fruitless treatments, culminating in withdrawal from society and condemning the sufferer to a life of misery and disability. This is a phenomenon in which the diagnosis is far more disabling than the symptoms.”

• One woman “hangs her mail on a clothesline for weeks before reading it, to allow the toxins in the ink to dissipate.”

• Another woman tried living in a six-by-nine-foot porcelain hut, but now just spends almost all her time on her porch, no matter how cold it gets.

• Yet another wears a protective mask while shopping but still develops breathlessness, palpitations, and vomiting when she smells gasoline fumes.

What exactly are the symptoms? According to one MCS supporter, “the illness can cause all the symptoms of every disease or disorder known [in] psychology, psychiatry, and the general medical profession.” One group studying the claims made by those who support the existence of this affliction listed the following symptoms:

The paper went on to say, “Unfortunately this is not a complete list of symptoms.” If you haven’t suffered at least a dozen of the listed symptoms in the past year, you’re probably an android.

Apparently, there is no limit to the number of symptoms. If the number of symptoms are unlimited; what about the causes? The sky is the limit for causes also! Virtually anything and everything is claimed to be sources of causation.

According to Herman Staudenmayer, a Denver psychologist and MCS skeptic, “There’s no chemical that is safe. There’s no food that is safe.” Gots went on to explain how MCS can become ‘trendy'. “Support groups are contagious. They tell everybody what all the things are that give them symptoms, and that’s a contagious thing to do.”

This is an incurable affliction because it cannot be defined by the treatment. Let me explain. If I claim to have a sore throat and the doctor gives me an antibiotic, and the antibiotic works, then I had a sore throat. And the “cure” proves it is a sore throat because it works. “MCS is not considered a curable disease, and the treatments are as diverse as the symptoms and causes.” Those who claim to have MCS are probably more afflicted by the cures than the symptoms. There are about 400 believing practitioners providing services…unending services…to those who claim to be afflicted with this ailment. What do they do?

• One Maryland physician “prescribes a combination of the drugs phentermine and fenfluramine for MCS, which are actually weight loss drugs in the amphetamine family.

• One doctor prescribes a “macrobiotic diet – based on grains and vegetables, free of wheat and dairy products,” making the claim that “it works by detoxifying the body, especially critical in today’s toxin-ridden world.”

• “Another clinical ecologist reportedly agrees with the macrobiotic diet but also recommends avoiding tap water, caffeine, and alcohol. He tells MCS sufferers to rid their homes of toxic chemicals such as cleaners and pesticides, improve the ventilation system, and avoid all drugs, whether prescription or over the counter.”

• Saunas supposedly ‘sweat out toxins.’ “But you can’t sweat out a toxin, because the sweat glands aren’t connected to any of the organs that process toxins.”

• This is the one I find most fascinating! “A Sacramento-area specialist treats many of his patients with injections of ‘the north wind.’ He bubbles air through water, then injects the water as a ‘neutralizer.’ Why the north wind? Because many of his patients complain they feel worse when the wind blows from that direction.

Does this give the impression of “witch doctoring,” versus real doctoring? Impossible to prove, yes, but also impossible to disprove. However, the most commonly used test for MCS is something called provocation-neutralization. When this test was subjected to real science in a double blind study it was found that “the subjects reported the same number of symptoms whether they received test agents or saline solution.” As one former believer in MCS, and a designer of the study noted; MCS “is not science.

So what is the problem with just having a naming bill? The American Medical Association (AMA) does not recognize this as a disease. In short the AMA believes that it doesn’t exist! But when the state decides that it wants to make society “aware” of this affliction; they are in point of fact saying it exists. If the state says it exists then it exists, science or lack there-in notwithstanding. So then if it exists, there must be a cause. If there is a cause, then the cause must be addressed. This really is the slippery slope that would ultimately be used by the activists to attempt to ban a host of things; especially pesticides. This bill could have become a nightmare for Ohio’s industry and economy as a whole.

It is unusual for a bill to be set aside in some fashion once it has hit the legislative floor. Fortunately the board of directors Ohio Applicator for Responsible Regulations (OPARR) became aware of the introduction of this bill and along with members of the OPMA board acted on this information. We can thank all those involved for their commitment and activism in behalf of our industry. We also need to recognize just how important OPARR is to our association and all of the application industries.

Comments will not be accepted that are rude, crude, stupid or smarmy. Nor will I allow ad hominem attacks or comments from anyone who is "Anonymous”. There have been a number of anonymous comments that were very supportive of my articles. Those comments were not posted because they were “Anonymous”. I thank those who have done so, but I will stay consistent to my rules for posting comments. RK

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"Safety advocates who say that we shouldn't take chances, but should ban things that might be unsafe, don't seem to understand that if we banned every food to which somebody had an allergy we could all starve to death." Thomas Sowell

About Me

Green is a mixture of blue and yellow. That is the only factual definition of green that will stand the test of time. After that; any other definition is a corruption of a perfectly nice color. I have been an exterminator for 35 years. I have served as a trustee on industry association boards representing pesticide and fertilizer applicators actively for almost 25 years. I believe that what we do isn't just a job; it's a mission! We are that thin gray line that mans the wall telling the world; "no one will harm you on my watch". I also believe that to be green is to be irrational, misanthropic and morally defective. They are the barbarians at the gate we have to stand against. Our greatest worry is those within who support and facilitate their misanthropic goals.